Choices and Conclusions

zippy2006 said:

Part of the difficulty here is that Ophiolite's post actually requires that he is not absolutely, positively, 100% right. Note the bolding:

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You know, you're right!!!

Why am I getting flashbacks from Fiddler on the Roof?

2PhiloVoid said:

I'm not here to accuse you or anyone else of being bad, sinful or disruptive, or for being racist, or sexist, or whatnot.

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I'm not sure what prompted this reply. We were discussing cognitive biases. Everyone has them, including us/them. It's not a judgement against everyone. It's just a fact of life.

partinobodycular said:

Be that as it may, does it really matter whether I have biases or not, so long as I allow compassion to override them?

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I'm not going to answer. I'm going to let you work it out for yourself.

Meowzltov said:

I'm not sure what prompted this reply. We were discussing cognitive biases. Everyone has them, including us/them. It's not a judgement against everyone. It's just a fact of life.

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What prompted it is an opportunity for me to not only address more than you asked for, but to put out there some subtle hints to onlookers who lately have been giving me the razz for my apparent "arrogance" or "lack of humility," some of which is an expression of my thoughts on what may constitute my own 'US / THEM' attribution.

My apologies for being long winded.

On the other hand, Cognitive Bias is a central concern of philosophers being that it is a multi-fold of the fallacies listed within informal logic. Obviously, we can all have some form of Cognitive Bias, but we should also discern clearly when an one individual is committing more than his own share of capitalizing on these biases, and with Critical Thinking and Logic in tow, they can be (and should be) pared down to a negligible level when possible.

And it is possible, which is why I say, "I don't have Cognitive Bias." If folks want to insist that I do, then they need to specifically spot EXACTLY which cognitive bias I am committing or expressing---apart from any other potential fallacies I may be emitting---and allow me to reflect, dissect and then confirm that that is the case. As it is, I find that too often some folks (though not all) like to jump the gun and assert very hasty generalizations that don't fully or even actually represent my level of bias.

Meowzltov said:

I'm not going to answer. I'm going to let you work it out for yourself.

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Actually I've been thinking about it, and my conclusion is that I don't have an 'us' and a 'them'... I simply don't, and I'll let you work that out for yourself as well. For all of their differences and imperfections, people are just people.

Those who have the least amount of biases is with those who can very quickly recognize/realize when they are having a bias, and move/work very, very quickly to eliminate them, and/or get rid of them, etc, whatever that might take, especially laying aside your own pride/ego, which is a huge source of a lot of biases that are greatly, greatly limiting a lot of people, etc.

But it's not easy to get rid of though, and it can always rear it's ugly head at any time, etc. One way you can know or tell is how hard you'll defend a certain thing sometimes, when it doesn't agree with your own perspective/point of view, etc. And there's some other ways of knowing as well, etc.

I hate my own pride/ego because I know it can blind me from other sources of new knowledge/perspectives/points of view that I might not be considering, or might be missing, etc. And the last thing I want to be/do is be someone without those sources of knowledge/perspectives/points of view, which is what clinging to your own pride/ego does to you, etc. And every time you gain some/a new knowledge/perspective/point of view, it puffs up also, making it even that much more difficult to acquire new ones each time it does, so it's a neverending, constant battle/struggle, etc.

But it's a great source of biases/limitations in a lot of people, etc. This is why a lot of people can be/seem very smart, but at the same time it becomes abundantly clear that they also have a ton of biases that are preventing them from learning anything else or acquiring/getting/gaining any more new knowledge, or learning anything new, etc.

They've just stayed where they are at after learning some knowledge a long, long time ago for a very long time now, and it's pretty sad, etc. And they'd never admit that some others are now surpassing them, etc. Because this most usually only comes the most when you are 100% fully willing to set aside your own pride/ego.

And some might say that my faith is a bias of mine, etc. But my faith is actually just a choice of mine, etc. And the truth that I think I now have/know, is just a possibility, etc. And it is my opinion that if any of it is in any way at all true, then it's one of the only ways it still can be true still, logically, etc.

And so when I'm dealing with non-believers, I try to tell them that it's just a possibility that I choose to have faith in, but that I guess we'll find out in the end, etc.

And if I'm wrong, then I don't think I've lost anything, and that my choosing to believe in the possibility that I now have, has it itself, opened up whole entire avenues of a lot of other possibilities, etc. But, no, I don't know for certain, etc, but that's also where faith comes in, etc. And it's not exactly a bias on my part because of that, etc. You can't deny the possibility if it's an actual real possibility, etc. Which I think mine still is, etc.

Most of the assumptions in the possibility that I present are only logical, etc. If any of it is in any way true I mean, etc. And it doesn't ever contradict or come into conflict with most of the other knowledge that we now consider facts now today, etc. And I think that makes it very, very unique from any of the rest of the other ones that right now exists today, etc.

God Bless.

Neogaia777 said:

Most of the assumptions in the possibility that I present are only logical, etc. If any of it is in any way true I mean, etc. And it doesn't ever contradict or come into conflict with most of the other knowledge that we now consider facts now today, etc. And I think that makes it very, very unique from any of the rest of the other ones that right now exists today, etc.

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I was pretty much in complete agreement with you... right up until this last paragraph, but I can't say that it surprises me that you don't recognize that this is a bias. In fact it's more or less the definition of a bias. You're interpreting the available information in such a way as to make your preconceptions seem logical. Now you may argue that they're not preconceptions, but rather an impartial examination of the facts, which is exactly what makes a bias so difficult to overcome... it doesn't see itself as being a bias.

partinobodycular said:

I was pretty much in complete agreement with you... right up until this last paragraph, but I can't say that it surprises me that you don't recognize that this is a bias. In fact it's more or less the definition of a bias. You're interpreting the available information in such a way as to make your preconceptions seem logical. Now you may argue that they're not preconceptions, but rather an impartial examination of the facts, which is exactly what makes a bias so difficult to overcome... it doesn't see itself as being a bias.

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You're kinda implying that it's automatically bias to believe something (or anything) though?

And some of them are preconceptions, but that's also why I just try to tell other non-believers that they're just only a possibility, etc.

If I told you what all of them were, then you'd see that most of it/them were only arrived at/could only be arrived.at, only by following certain lines of thinking to their only logically possible conclusions/outcomes, etc. But possible doesn't mean for sure though, but just possible only, etc. And as long as an individual has that in mind, or is very, very careful to make that distinction, then I don't think it has to become a bias for them, etc. And, in fact, most of them could only be arrived at only if someone was almost completely free from some of the most common to man/people's most usual biases, as that might be one of it's safeguards, etc. But I'd have to try and tell you all of it or most of it for you to see that though probably, etc. And a lot of it I can't talk about here, because it's not allowed, etc. But being impartial is the only way to arrive at some of these conclusions when it comes to certain lines of thinking that I think I mostly now know, etc.

Take Care/God Bless.

partinobodycular said:

You're interpreting the available information in such a way as to make your preconceptions seem logical.

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I'm applying logic to knowledge to determine what's still possible and not possible, and some of it is opinion from there, etc, but it doesn't directly contradict/challenge any of the other truths found by the sciences or philosophy and such.